"Whom do you choose, Lasha? Your mother... or your love?"

The question cut through her like a blade--cold, precise, lethal--ready to sever her soul.

She stood frozen, her breath caught somewhere between her lungs and her heart. This decision should never have belonged to a teen: to choose between her mother and the man she loved--between the rhythm of her heartbeat and the reason it ever raced. Loyalty or love. Life or death.

Her knees buckled, but before she could collapse, a pair of merciless hands yanked her upright. They held her firm--not to support her, but to ensure she wouldn't escape the cost of her silence. 

A sharp whistle.

Crack.

The lash split the air, then rent her skin, branding her soul. The pain rippled outward--flesh torn, blood drawn. But worse than the searing agony across her back was the dread pooling in her chest--the pain of knowing what came next. Of what they would make her do. She knew, then-- this was only the beginning.

Somewhere nearby, voices pleaded. Maids crying out for mercy, begging for the Queen's respect--her mother's life. But their cries were nothing against the measured cruelty of the men who stood at the doors, dressed in silk and draped in deceit. They smiled as they wielded pain--monsters not from myth, but born of blood and family ties.

A needle pierced her neck.

The chill came next-- an icy flood through her veins. Pain surged. She thrashed, fought, her instincts roared--but the poison was relentless. Her vision warped. Sounds blurred into echoes. Shapes melted into shadows. Time dissolved as confusion settled in.

In the haze, she searched for him.

Aru?

His name passed her lips in a broken whisper, her last tether to clarity. The only one who had never asked her to choose, who protected her fiercely in a world ruled by lies.

As the drug pulled her under, she knew one thing with brutal certainty: she had crossed a threshold. And whatever she had done tonight, whatever choice had been forced from her... would haunt her until the end. 

She surrendered to the poison, unaware that her surrender was the call for destruction. 

Fire devoured everything.

It surged through the lanes, scaling walls, consuming beams, crackling like laughter turned deranged. It lit up the night in orange fury, choking the air with the stench of burning wood, cloth, memories--childhood giggles, stolen glances, promises whispered in the dark. 

She staggered through the smoke, lungs raw, each step heavier than the last. No one needed to tell her.

She was the reason.

She did this.

Her knees shook, but it wasn't the smoke. It was the guilt, clawing through her like the flames devouring the only place that ever felt like him. She walked--staggering--through what was left of the mansion. She tried to scream. Her lungs protested. Her eyes stung. But silence hit harder than smoke.

No screams. No cries. No voices. Just absence.

That was worse than pain. 

It confirmed her fear.

He was gone.

Rud. Her Hazel. Her love.

The one she might have sacrificed for a false choice.

Gone.

She stumbled forward, desperate, choking on ash and regret. Every step a punishment. The universe had passed its sentence, and it was final--this was what she deserved.

And then she saw him.

A silhouette waiting in the inferno. Tall. Calm. Cruel.

Her stepfather.

He didn't speak immediately. Just watched her with a predator's calm, unaffected by the destruction around them.

"You should've known better, Lasha," he said, his voice like poison, lips curving into a grotesque smile. "Love makes you weak."

She didn't flinch from fear--her body quaked with rage. This man. This betrayal. It would be etched into her marrow. The taste of grief, the stench of betrayal, the heat of vengeance--she would remember every second, and she would return it.

A guard appeared beside him, voice urgent.

"My Lord--the prince. He was still inside."

The words fell like a hammer.

Her chest hollowed.

Aru.

Her brother.

What had she done?

She swayed--the drug still fogged her thoughts--but this cut through. Sharp. Brutal.

She whispered his name, but the confusion won't let go. She tried to think, to feel, but the poison's grip tightened.

Her stepfather's chuckle echoed through the blaze, sharp as shattered glass. Was he truly the man she had once loved dearly as a father?

"Beloved sister," he said, mockery dripping from every word, " burned him alive. Her own brother. All because he loved her more than she deserved."

Everything fractured. Reality shattered. The last thread of herself snapped.

She dropped to her knees, the heat blistering her skin, the weight of her own sins pressing down. Her trembling fingers found the cold chain around her neck--suddenly colder than steel. The locket, once a promise, now a curse. A reminder of what she had destroyed.

Everything she had once believed in crumbled with the walls around her.

"Aru," she murmured again, as if saying it could undo the fire, reverse time, bring him back.

I killed them.

But the poison in her blood was stronger now, dragging her deeper and deeper into a stupor of half-memories and choking guilt. The truth slipped away. All that remained was: I shredded my life with my own bare hands.

Her world spun out of focus, the flames flickering in her blurred vision.

She was dragged, unfeeling, into a realm darker than the one outside.

And then--nothing.

That day, she lost everything she was proud of. A nightmare she never knew existed began. Her begging fell on deaf ears. Her screams were ignored.

Yet, it was only the beginning.

The world would never know what she had become.

Not yet.

But one day, she would rise.

I promise you, Lasha.

She would not remember collapsing. She would not feel her body hitting the scorched ground. But when she woke--when her eyes opened again--it would not be as the girl who loved, or the sister who trusted.

That girl was gone. Burned.

The world would write its story, never understanding the truth.

The day she emerged, she would be reborn--not as Lasha, the daughter, sister or lover--but as:

Queen Lashika Mauryavanshi

Cold. Unyielding. Consumed by ambition.

Born in ash. Shaped by betrayal. Crowned by pain.

But the world would never know what she had lost to become that woman. It would never see the night she shattered, the price she paid, or the vow that rose from the ruins.

She would rebuild.

Not in the name of love. Not in the name of loyalty.

But for power.

Because darkness wasn't weakness--it was crucible.

Only those who survived the dark knew how to wield it. Only they emerged unbreakable.

The darkness they forced upon her would not drown her--it would sculpt her. In that realm where nightmares whispered and demons clawed at every scar and regret, she learned the truth:

You don't escape the dark. You become it.

The demons inside her whispered that she had failed, that she would never rise again.

She listened.

Then she silenced them.

They would all learn.

In their eyes, she was helpless. Her silence, a surrender.

"But when she struck, they'd never see it coming."

Are you guys excited?

Please do share your reviews.

Follow whisperedmanuscripts on Instagram for spoilers and anything related to updates.